Reading ruminations ~ a saltmarsh mosquito

Barbara Brown Taylor was writing about reverence in this quote from An Altar in the World, p. 22:

Properly attended to, even a saltmarsh mosquito is capable of evoking reverence.  See those white and black striped stockings on legs thinner than a needle?  Where in those legs is there room for knees?   And yet see how they bend, as the bug lowers herself to your flesh.  Soon you and she will be blood kin.  Your itch is the price of her life.   Swat her if you must, but not without telling her she is beautiful first.

I was walking the treadmill (for my life) when I read this and was absolutely shocked that my eyes teared up.  I am so allergic to bug bites that I can feel the difference between a gnat, a mosquito, a flea.  So I have killed many in my lifetime.  Never once did I say, "You are beautiful," though I have said, forlornly, "Why didn't you stay outside?"  (Click to enlarge picture, so you can see her beautiful legs.)